BSD

M. Tim Jones does a great job in "BSD Sockets Programming" of showing the reader step by step how to develop network applications, what to keep in mind, and what to look out for. His explainations are clear and well written. The major strength of this book is that it covers so many languages so well. There are a good set of refrence for each language and then many example implemntations in the Software Patterns section.

This book does not cover IPv6, which is fine and the author states at the beginning. I would liked to have seen a little more coverage of threads and network programming, but as it is the reader will have a good foundation of network programming and a good refrence on their bookshelf.

I am a complete FreeBSD newbie. I got this book hoping to be able to set up a FreeBSD server, and accomplished it with help from the book, but there were some differences and some confusing points in this book, but that's to be expected with revisions in FreeBSD itself. The only true complaint I have with this book is that it does not go into full descriptions on certain things; Example they begin talking about topic one, then branches off from there going into depth about topic two, then topic three, while your still wondering what topic one was still all about. That happened maybe twice in this book. Other than that, its a great beginners book.

This book is by far the best source of info for those new to UNIX. It takes a step by step approach explaining all aspects of the FreeBSD environment and basic UNIX concepts. Even if you never install FreeBSD, this book is a great reference that is applicable to any UNIX/Linux environment. For you cheap skates, this same book is available on line at the FreeBSD website.

With this second edition, the FreeBSD Handbook comes of age. It even has an index now!
Nik Clayton and Murray Stokley (and many contributors) have rewritten a good deal and clarified more, and added real screen shots.
Yes, it's available on your hard drive. But for me a book is a better random access device than computer file (or a bunch of html files)--I have a better chance of finding what I need and keeping it open on my desktop (the real one) while I'm working.
The handbook tends to be less task-oriented than other books (of which there are still only a handful) and focuses more on FreeBSD itself than on UNIX in general, but it's an essential reference.
I think the editors and contributors did a great job.

I used this book from cover to cover in a Unix Socket Programming class. A few good points about this book: 1) The sample do compiled on Linux with no problems. That's a plus. 2) The author emphasized good client-server design principles. 3) The introduction is gentle and very readble. 4) The code sample is directly,simple and not riddled with unnecessary details to "show off" like some authors do.

You don't need much Unix to do exercise in this book.About the only System calls you need to know are fork(),Select(),sigalarm() and execve(). The book could have been expanded to cover HTTP,SOAP and some other protocols to give it a 5stars.

Get all three volumes. There is no better way to learn TCP/IP. The read is excellent. The examples are very excellent. Definiirly, a classic for years to come.

This book is very well written. I suspect it was written with college students in mind. As a professional, I went through it like a hot knife through butter. I really liked his showing a number of ways to solve a problem, with a discussion of the tradeoffs (e.g., iterative vs. concurrent servers). The programming is in ANSI C. I enjoyed seeing a makefile and some Bourne shell scripts in this book. So many authors act like this stuff doesn't even exist. You might want to get the UNIX Network Programming, Vol.1, book by W. Richard Stevens also. The Stevens book serves better as a reference and has more detail. E.g., Stevens talks about tcpdump, but Comer doesn't. Yet Comer's book is very easy to read and gives you a clear picture without drowning you in details.

This is the best BSD book out there for newbies. The conversational style as well as the actual text formatting make this the easiest reading book on the subject. Others were WAY TOO technical for comprehension without repeated study. This one gets your feet wet in a comfortable manner, but still covers just about everything you need to know to make BSD into a secure, reliable SERVER.

Be aware, no X-windows coverage here! If that's your issue, go to FreeBSD Unleashed. While I never read it, I know it covers X.

This book is by far the most useful and helpful book I've read for setting up a *NIX server (and as my husband and I have set up several dozen Linux boxes, a couple of SGIs, and an HP-UX machine, believe me when I say I've read several). The author uses a light, humorous and conversational tone throughout, making the book an easy read even for newbies, but that doesn't mean it's lacking in technical information-- just reading Chapter 9 (Too Much Information About /etc) is enough to make your head spin.

Mr. Lucas starts from the beginning with installing FreeBSD (a chapter that I admit I skipped at first, and I ended up reinstalling because of it), and goes all the way up through such non-trivial events as system panics and how to respond to them (unfortunately, most of the best options require some proactive configuring, so the bulk of the people who need the information will be unprepared. But that is hardly the author's fault). In between, he spends several chapters discussing how to secure your system, which is probably the single most important element to setting up any computer for any use, and also the most ignored.

The book is, admittedly, a little light in X11 and other desktop-machine elements (a mere 14 pages are devoted to the entire subject), and is more suited to those wishing to set up a server. It's evident, however, that the author has had a great deal of experience with setting up FreeBSD servers for a number of uses in a number of environments, as there's enough information in the book to set up your server as:

* An all-purpose Internet host

* A dedicated mail host

* A high performance web server

* A firewall

* A fileserver on a Microsoft network

* A backup server

* A nameserver

* A network-monitoring server

While it's highly unlikely that you would ever want a single server to do all of the above, the information is there for you to pick and choose what you need for your particular environment. And throughout it all, Michael Lucas keeps his irreverent yet easily understood tone.

A lot of effort went into compiling this book, and it shows. Virtually all aspects of FreeBSD administration are touched on. It is well written and concise (no fluff). Finally, a single source. No more scouring the web and newsgroups for answers on the basics. Well done.

If you are already a BSD kernel expert you might use this as a reference. If you're an advanced "userland" programmer who wants to start learning about kernel internels, this is one way to proceed but, it is very, very difficult.

I wish Kirk had decided to show us more of the joy of programming the kernel. If he had, the book would have been worth at least twice it's current price.

Although the book isn't technically rigorous like Tanenbaum's book, D&I of 4.4BSD does an excellent job of explaining processes, memory, I/O, IPC etc with regards to BSD. The text is sprinkled with snippets of code where examples are needed. I especially recommend this book to College students, as it is relatively easy to comprehend, compared to others I have read.

While this book has been written by some of the best in the UNIX arena, their strong focus on packing a lot of content into these pages at times can prove a burden to the reader.

Reading through the chapters, it appears that the book could have been rendered more readable if a knowledgeable technical editor had put the finishing touches on it.

Nevertheless, even though it takes a bit of time to get used to the different writing styles and differences in quality of several chapters, this books is a well of insights into the internal workings of BSD 4.4 and its derivatives (like Mac OS X).

In order to gain the most from this title, I strongly urge interested readers to already have worked their way through Maurice J. Bach's "The Design of the UNIX Operating System".

This book is a hard copy of the online documentation you can get for free at freeBSD.org except that it doesn't match the version of freeBSD that is shipped on the CD.

A good book for those who either need to know where to start to do something under FreeBSD, or those would already know most of what they need to and just need a reminder of something they might be forgetting.

However, the biggest shortcoming of this book is that it leads you into a topic, gets you going, and then drops you right at the point when you need it most.

Example: the book has a chapter on printing. The average home user probably has an inkjet printer, or a low-end laser. The author, though, has a fully PostScript-compatible printer, and goes on to set up printing as if everyone has this printer. No ground is covered for the every-day people, ie how to set up filters to allow PostScript printing to non-PS printers.

Also leaves other areas short, such as updating the operating system. The book has excellent coverage of how to rebuild the kernel, but if you compare the book's steps on how to update the rest of the system (ie using CVS to get from 3.2 to 3.4) with the docs provided with the operating system, or provided on the web (especially at the FreeBSD.org Handbook section) then the author misses a huge chunk of stuff that has the ability to kill a machine (yes, this happened to me but I was lucky enough to catch it before the reboot to let the system come up with the new rev of the OS).

I used the book for about the first two weeks of adding/configuring components, then realised I was getting better information off the web, provided I was willing to take the time to find it.

IMHO FreeBSD is the best server Operating System available and this book covers all of the details for both beginners and experienced Unix Admins alike. If you are considering using FreeBSD I strongly urge you to buy this book. The bootable CDs that come with the book make installation a breeze.

One of the truly great features of this book are the man pages that make up about half of the book. The ability to sit on the couch and study a man page for some task or other is simply wonderful and saves the paper that would otherwise be used to print it.

The book covers in step by step fashion the setup of all normally used aspects of the system and covers them in great detail. The section on compiling a custom kernel is simply fantastic and an excellent guide for beginners. Building a custom kernel is a vital part of a fully functioning Unix system and this book makes it as simple as a cookbook.

BSD MEDICAL CORP.: International Competitive Benchmarks and Financial Gap Analysis